Tacita
by windandwater93
Summary: Juliet Geddyng has just been released from her stay at a psychiatric institution after the strange death of both her parents and is now in the care of her older sister, Anita, who, two years ago, married. Going back to the family home brings up the dark memories of that night for Juliet, who believes that a local legend has come to life and is now back to finish what it started.


_I'm back at Geddying House. It is dark, though I am not sure of the time. The clock faces are bare; no numbers, no hands. The world within the house is silent though, somewhere far off, I hear the sound of the cicadas and the creak of the swing on the front porch as it is rocked back and forth by the breeze. I am walking back up the stairs, a hand on the smooth banister, the other holding an already sweating glass of water. The ice cubes clink against the sides as I make my way up._

_I am wearing my nightdress, the light blue one my mother had bought me for Christmas last year. It was good to wear on hot nights like this one. My dad often liked to turn off the air conditioning once in a while, run fans in our rooms through the night as we slept. Once morning came, we all awoke, my mother, my older sister and I, to the cold of the air conditioning as it once again streamed through the house._

_My sister's room was vacant of a body, however, this night. She had moved out several years ago, to go to school in the city. She said she would miss us, but, secretly, I knew she was happy to go; happy to leave us behind. Leave me behind._

_Her room was the first one I passed as I walked down the hall. Already I felt a sense of uneasiness course through me. My parents' bedroom door was wide open, open like a gaping mouth to the hall._

_I have no voice here, and if I called out for them, I did not hear it. I am still walking, however, more slowly, more hesitantly, than before._

_The lamplight is on, the glow of it is faint. My mother likes to keep it on sometimes, so she can read. Dad pretends to hate it when she does it, but the tone of his voice says otherwise._

_Still, something does not feel right as I walk down the hall. I should just go to my room, but I find myself walking on past it, towards the mouth of my parents'. My footsteps are silent; my heart is in my throat, in my ears. It is like I am swimming underwater._

_I am standing in the doorway, now, looking in. The room has gone dark, save for the moonlight that shines through the gossamer curtains. It envelopes the room in a white sheen. There is a figure there, a silhouette. She is standing at the foot of my parents' bed, stiff as a board._

_I cannot move, and she knows it._

"_Quiet, now," she says. Her voice is gravelly. "They're sleeping."_

_Slowly she turns her head to look at me. I cannot see her face, for there is no face to see. It is nothing but a black hole. But I could feel her burning eyes, see her red-stained mouth as she smiled._

"_Go back to your room," she commands. "And cover your ears, my little blackbird. Cover them tight and don't make a peep."_

_I try to do as she says, but I cannot. I am rooted to the spot. All I can do is drop the glass of water._

_I don't even hear it as it hits the floor and shatters._

Patrick Rutledge's room is too white. He tries to make up for it with the dark purple couch and all the plants, so many, in fact, it reminds me of a greenhouse. He has no curtains, so the light shines through and is almost blinding.

But I don't look around much when I'm here in this room. All I can do is sit, cowered in the corner of the couch, a pillow tucked in between my knees and my chest. I pick at the cuticles of my nails, or bite them, a habit I've come to pick up in the past three years. Sometimes I look up at Dr. Rutledge, just to study his face. More than not, however, I just listen to the scratch of his pen as he writes, or the little coughs he makes sometimes before he says something. I have come to learn that just sitting there and talking is always better than looking up.

"You've made progress."

I'm picking at my left thumb today, so I don't make a move to catch his eye as he says this. "What do you mean?"

"You've gotten farther, this time. Usually you don't get any farther than the landing or your own bedroom door. Now you've made it all the way into your parents' room."

"And that's a good thing?"

"It certainly adds a lot more details. The silhouette of the woman, her talking to you."

I don't say anything to this and continue to pick aimlessly at my thumb.

"There was one thing she said that seemed to catch my attention. 'Little blackbird'. Do you know what that might mean?"

Something catches in my throat and I stop what I'm doing, just for a moment.

Dr. Rutledge seems to notice. "It's alright. We don't-"

"It was my dad's nickname for me," I manage to say quite suddenly. "He…He always said it whenever he wanted to make me feel better."

"So why do you think the woman said that to you?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. To hurt me, I guess?"

"Maybe instead of hurting, it's your mind trying to comfort you."

"Maybe."

There is silence for a few ticks of the clock on his desk before he sniffs and clicks his pen. "Listen, Juliet."

His chair squeaks as he shifts around and I slowly move my head to look up at him. Dr. Rutledge is staring at me over the rim of his glasses. There is a softness to his brown eyes and it is almost comforting. He sits his notebook down, then leads forward, clasping his hands together. His wedding ring catches the sunlight and it winks at me, like a star.

"What you went through that night… You were eighteen years old, about to go forth on the next step of life, and then it was abruptly taken from you. It was traumatic, and it is not something you can get over in three years. Things like that take time to heal. And, frankly…" A hint of a smile broke out under his thick mustache. "Frankly, I don't think you're going to get much further here."

I blinked. "What?"

"You're going home." His smile grew broader. "With as much progress as you've made, I gave the administrators here my professional opinion that a young woman such as yourself shouldn't be cooped up. She should be at home, with family, friends. Do things that every twenty-one year old should do."

"I'm...going home?" I stared at him in wide-eyed amazement. "You…You really think I'm ready?"

"What more do you want from me?" He laughed. "Go home, Juliet. Go out and party. Get into trouble, have fun, go parking for Christ's sake. Live!"

I felt my face grow hot and the corners of my mouth turned up at his words.

"I mean it, Juliet. I think you've spent more than enough time here. This is a new chapter for you."

A new chapter, I thought. Why did that sound so wonderful and yet so terrifying at the same time?

"Your sister is coming to pick you up in a few hours. If I didn't know any better, I'd say that was a pretty damn good birthday gift."

My birthday. I'd completely forgotten. "Happy birthday to me," I whispered.

"Happy birthday to you, Juliet." Dr. Rutledge sank back in his chair. "I'm sure Anita is going to be happy to see you."

Hawthorne Ridge was home to over two hundred and fifty residents, a place of solitude tucked away in the great mountains of Tennessee where patients could heal in silence and breathe in clean, unpolluted air.

I had been here for three years, watched people come and go, watched some get better, watched others relapse. I hadn't really made that many friends here, so there was really no one to say goodbye to, no one who would miss me come four o'clock.

I looked over my room, a place I had once dubbed a broom closet. The single bed in the corner, with its white sheets, white pillows, puce colored blanket, always tucked in neatly. The little desk and rolling stool, where I'd spent countless hours writing on the loose leaf paper they gave me. The built in single shelf where my cactus Lavern sat, next to two snow globes, one from Rome, the other from Tybee Island in Georgia. Both of them were birthday gifts; sweet Lavern was a Christmas gift along with the woven Navajo rug that I had placed alongside my bed.

All sent to me along with a postcard and a handwritten letter from Anita.

I smiled as I grabbed the picture of me and her from the desk and placed it into my suitcase, next to the thick black binder that one of the assistants had given to me for my papers. We were both smiling in this photo. It was her eighteenth birthday and I had been fourteen. We both wore tanktops and shorts and her long arm was draped over my shoulders as we sat there on the porch swing smiling wide for Mom's camera. Anita's blonde hair was up in a messy bun, loose strands framing her face while my wild black hair hung just past my shoulders in thick curls. We were sisters, but so different. She had been a rock after Mom and Dad, while I…

I blinked and immediately went back to my room. No. There was nothing else, nothing save for Lavern who I would have to carry.

A knock at the door broke my train of thought and I turned to the doorway. A young nurse was standing there.

"Miss Geddying?"

"Uh-huh?"

She smiled softly. "Your sister is here. She's early."

I smiled back. "That's Anita for you." I closed the lid on my suitcase. "Thanks."

"Not a problem, dear. She'll be waiting for you out in the front lobby."

I nodded and watched as she disappeared from my doorway and down the hall.

"Well," I said, zipping up my suitcase. "Here goes nothing." I plucked the cactus from the shelf. "Come on Lavern. Time to start my new chapter."


End file.
